Artist > DJ > Producer > Storyteller 
Innovator of Hi-Tech-Soul. 

The music career of Dimitri Kneppers (1967), generally known as ‘Dimitri’, reads like an encyclopaedia. A Dutch encyclopaedia, that is. After  nearly 40 years of spinning records you could call him a true veteran, known for his enormous sensitivity, true feeling and mixing skills.

Dimitri starts his deejay career in clubs by the age of 17. 

In 1988 he obtains a residency at the legandary RoXY in Amsterdam and becomes one of the pioneers of house music in The Netherlands.

His HTSM (Hi-Tech-Soul Movement) nights draws clubbers from all over the globe to hear his own unique style of music and mixing techniques. 

By 1991 he spins at all the major (warehouse) parties in The Netherlands, Belgium and Italy.

He releases his first records and starts his own label Be.S.T. (Beautiful Soul Techno). 

From 1992 onwards he continues to take over the world with gigs from Tokyo to Australia, Paris to Peru and residences at Twilo in New York and Ibiza.

In 2007 Dimitri takes a 3 year sabbatical (after playing non-stop for 23 years), trading the club scene for life on a farm and voluntary work with children with learning disabilities. 

In 2010 he returns with his ‘All Night Long’ residency at the legandary club Trouw Amsterdam, one of the best venues in Europe.  

In 2013 he suffers from a life threatening bacterial infection and loses his right underleg. But he is back at the desks in Trouw in only 5 months, proving that music has the power to heal, one of his strong inner beliefs.

Today Dimitri plays in clubs and at festivals all over Europe.
At Amsterdam’s number one venue Thuishaven he finds his new residency for his infamous 10 hour storytelling sets, taking the crowd on a journey through a wide range of energetic, spacious, melodic and hypnotic musicstyles. 

As a producer Dimitri (Kneppers) is always working on new music.
He releases on labels like KMS, Planet E Communications Detroit and Metrohm.

Solid Ground was formed in 1991 or 1992 by Jaro, Nils, Erik and Daniel who all played in other bands before. After a few gigs here and there we recorded a demo at the Stilteloos studio with Daan v/d Elsken. We kept playing gigs in Holland and I vaguely remember winning some sort of price that gave us the opportunity to record another demo. This was done at the A.M.P. studio's with again Daan in the drivers seat. Come to think of it, we also did 'Grote prijs van Nederland' (a Dutch battle of the bands), won the forerounds but got disqualified 'cause we didn't play 3 songs but did our own thing. 1 short and 1 long song. Fuck those idiots. What also bothers me is that we never have gotten a price for the band that has had the most broken bones. All of us were working in bars and well, sometimes you break a leg, an arm, a knee, a hand, an ankle, a foot, a finger, a rib or 2. Mind you, we never blamed the booze!! Anyways, Erik left the band and Marco took over bassduties and him being Italian, booked us a tour in Italy rightaway. Also played Switzerland I believe. Next thing to do was to record an album. We spent 3 days and nights at the Waterfront studio with Jacques de Haard, I now remember he remixed our second demo too, and then we went home to finish later (what we never did). Timeline is a little blurry here. We went to Scandanavia on tour. Might have very well been before the recordingsession too. We went a ridin' from town to town just to find gigs cancelled. Luckely, 1 outdoor festifal in Sweden (could also have been Norway) came through and paid for most of the damage. Rob Reiner should have been there! The moment we set foot on stage it started raining... So did we go back and finish the album? Of course not. Somebody broke something and by the time he was all healed up we went back on the road. First some shows in Italy, that went actually very well, were it not that we had the van from hell, then a rest (another way of saying gigs were cancelled) in Triest. Next stop Yugoslavia, don't remember the city, where we probably played our best show ever, I think that was also the time we got our Solid Ground t-shirts stolen 'cause some soldiers were wearing them to the front. Did we or did we not went to Switzerland after that? I don't remember. Coming home, Marco left the band. And in came Michael. We practised a lot, played some shows, recorded some new songs at the Arenasleepin studio, and focussed on making a great record. We went back to the Waterfrontstudio with Jacques, took our time, spend a lot of money, but recorded Ground Zero. After that we did some shows but then the practiseroom got really wet and now we are taking some sabbatical years. A lot of them. The album came out on Konkurent records I think and if you want it, we just found a few and we keep you updated. All the demo's and misc recordings will also be released. Nils, dec 2007 ..


Umo Fracto, a.k.a Federico Giraldo, is a Colombian electronic musician.
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Umo Fracto, a.k.a Federico Giraldo, músico electrónico Colombiano. 

Gracias, bedankt, dankon, danke schoen,
domo arrigato,obrigado, merci, cok tesekkur ederim, tanemirt, thanks.......for listening to my music!

<a href=umofracto@gmail.com">Contact</a>

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